


Episode 8: Metropolis

by DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered



Series: The Canyon's Arms Are All We Know [8]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-11 10:46:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19108099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered/pseuds/DangersUntoldHardshipsUnnumbered
Summary: Astra decides to take a road trip.





	Episode 8: Metropolis

Astra hit the gas, heading herself, her pickup truck full of tightly packed produce crates, and her trailer, also filled with tightly packed produce crates, in the direction opposite the one Alex had ridden in when she left.

She had the radio on. It was playing country music. It hurt to listen to, but it also somehow comforted, so she chose to leave it playing. It was the frequency that Alex had put on during their drive back from the diner.

Her bed still smelled like Alex. Her skin still smelled like Alex. The cab of the truck still reeked of gasoline and huckleberries, and she wished to Rao that she hadn’t let her leave. She wished to Rao that she hadn’t brought her there in the first place. Because now she was remembering how alone she was, and it was breaking her.

She remembered that broadcast she’d heard, all those months ago, when she’d first gotten here. _“Loneliness is universal. And it shouldn’t be. We all need each other. We all need someone. I don’t think we should be afraid of that.”_

That soft voice, saying those gentle things.

She stared into the rain that spat against the red dust of the roadside and made dark spots on the asphalt. How rare and curious that it should rain now, when her heart was so inclined to its own weeping.

_“But the most important thing is, love, real love, needs proximity. It needs closeness. You can’t love someone from far away, not really. I think it’s the closeness that sands those edges off, that makes you fit better. Maybe I’m wrong, but I think proximity and intimacy aren’t the same thing, but they’re really hard to separate. You can’t be loved if you don’t ever let anyone get close enough to you to do it.”_

_What have I done?_ she thought. _I let someone get close to me and now I crave the closeness._

That voice had made her feel calm, had made her feel less alone when she’d first gotten here.

_“Just know, if you think you’re alone, you’re not alone. I’m lonely too, so even if you can’t talk to me, or you don’t know how, if you’re listening to this, then neither of us is alone.”_

A feeling nagged in Astra’s chest.She didn’t know where she was going. Probably to a filling station to buy a map and find another national park to set her trailer down. Starting again was that easy.

Why was she doing this? She’d heard the tone in Alex’s voice, the wistfulness, the fantasizing about “swinging by on the way back” and it panicked her. She couldn’t see Alex again. She couldn’t put down roots. She couldn’t reveal more than she already had and if she found herself in Alex’s arms again, she knew she would.

Alex needed to be loved, and Astra knew she wouldn’t be able to help loving her.

_“I have secrets too, and they make it hard for me to get close to people.But if you want, it's safe.”_

Astra’s heart stopped.

It was the same voice. Alex was the voice in the broadcast that she had listened to when she first got here. She was sure of it. Her interest in music, the songs she chose to play, the things she said. And her voice. Soft, comforting.

Astra pulled over to the roadside and watched a spectacular finger of desert lightning come poking down into the mountains, framing everything in white for a moment.The thunder beat in her chest. She couldn’t weep. She just sat there in shock. What were the odds? She had long assumed that Rao had not much influence this far away, but she had just crossed paths with the woman who had made her early days here bearable. She had been reminded what proximity and intimacy were.

How could she have let her go?

Cars crawled by, beaten into submission by the sudden, driving rain. Astra sat and watched it pour in sheets down her windshield. 

She had shared bodies with someone and let her closeness strip all her bark away and now she was here, a raw tree facing the elements.She suddenly hated her isolation, her loneliness, was crushed by an overwhelming sense of loss. 

She eased the truck and trailer back onto the highway and made careful time all the way down to Walt and Clem’s. She didn’t know what else to do.

 

 

******

 

 

It was a little on the late side, but Clem had stayed to wait out the storm.She looked surprised when Astra walked in, drenched and desperate.

“Angie? Good lord, girl, you look like who did it and ran!What the heck happened to you?”

How could she explain? “I lost someone.”

Clem’s face creased with concern. “What do you mean, honey? You lost a family member or something?”

Astra shook her head. Her brain was racing and she was finding this stupid language unwieldy.“I met someone. And then I lost them.” Her breath was shallow and her heart banged against her ribcage.

Clem nodded slowly. “I see. Told you you should have let me set you up with Walt’s nephew. You got your heart broke.”

Astra was growing frustrated. “No, not that. I met someone. We… had an intimacy. We agreed to part ways afterward. But I … I think I’ve made a terrible mistake.”

“Does this someone have a name?”

“Yes. Alex.”

“Don’t suppose you got his number, did you?”

Astra shook her head.“Not a he. And no, I didn’t.”

Clem paused for a moment to adjust. Astra was growing impatient and didn’t understand why Clem looked confused. “Oh.I see.So it’s Superman or else it’s ladies, huh?” She chuckled.

Astra didn’t see what was funny about that. “I’m not interested in Superman for sexual reasons. I just…” She caught herself short. “I was making a joke.”

“You’re no damn good at jokes, honey. You know, you coulda told me you were a gay. It ain’t like everyone doesn’t have a gay cousin or something nowadays.”Clem sighed. “So, you get a last name?”

Astra shook her head.She didn’t understand most of what Clem meant except for her first sentence and her last.

“Any other information like, where she’s from? What she does for a living? Hobbies?”

“She works for the FBI, she said. She’s from California. And she … likes music. I believe she had a radio broadcast of some kind for a while. I used to listen to it when I first arrived here.”

“Radio broadcast, huh? Now that’s something to work with.” She scratched her head and started tapping away on her laptop.

“What are you doing?”

Clem shrugged. “Trying to find something. What kind of show was it?”

“Music, mostly women. Songs that were sad and beautiful. She played…” She frowned, trying to remember the name of the artist Alex had played in the diner. “…Fleetwood Mick.”

“Mac. Fleetwood Mac.”

“Yes.”

“And she talked about love and loneliness.”

Clementine frowned. “That doesn’t sound like a show I was ever familiar with.”She got up,poured a cup from the bottom of the coffee pot and handed it to Astra. It had probably been sitting there for several hours and would be black as tar. Astra didn’t care. She dumped three creamers into it and drank while Clementine continued poking around.

“Well?” Astra asked after several minutes. She had finished the rancid coffee and was running out of things to do with herself.

Clem sighed and scratched her chin. “Well, I got my limits with this kind of thing. But maybe my niece can find something. I’m real good at finding rare car parts, but people are a little trickier.”

A thought occurred to Astra.“Where does Superman live?”

Clem stared at her. “Oh, come on now. Metropolis. Everyone knows that. Why? You gonna go find him?”

“Maybe.”

Clem gave her a sidelong glance now. “Because you were joking.”

“I wasn’t joking about wanting to meet him. Just about wanting to date him.”

Clem shook her head. “You’re an odd bird, Angie.”

“Which way is Metropolis?”

“Well, due east, but–”

Astra pushed her damp hair off her shoulders and stood up. “Thank you, Clem.”

“Wait a damn second!” Clementine got up and hauled herself around the counter. “Now, I don’t know what the heck your thing is with Superman, I don’t think he’s in the ‘searching for lost one-night stands’ business. But I think you’re crazy for trying to do any of this with no phone, driving across state lines, in a vehicle with no tags.”

Astra looked blankly at her for a moment. Clem was correct. Traveling too far risked contact with authorities. She had never had a phone, because she had never needed one.

“So, promise me, if you go out that door again, that you’ll go over to the cell phone store in that strip mall on 31 and get yourself a burner phone.”She grabbed one of the station’s business cards off the desk and thrust it into her palm. “Keep this in case you run into trouble. And call me with the number just in case.”

“In case what?”

“In case my niece finds your girl.” Clem held up a hand. “Hold on.” She went in back. Astra heard some clanking and crashing. A moment later, Clem returned with a couple of old license plates.“These are off of junkers. If you get pulled over and they run the plates you’re screwed, but at least you won’t attract any attention for driving around without tags.”

Astra nodded solemnly. “Thank you, Clementine.”

 

 

*******

 

 

The small taste of intimacy had done something to Astra’s soul. The veil had been lifted on how tired she was of being alone.Maybe Clem’s niece would find Alex, but in the meantime, she had a distant relative on this planet and she needed to find him.

As promised, once she figured out the workings of the burner phone, she contacted Clementine and gave her the number sequence.

“Do you think she’ll succeed?”

“I don’t know, honey. But I promise I’ll get her to do her best. I’ll bribe her with Chick-fil-A if I have to.”

Astra didn’t know what that meant, but Clem had clearly amused herself with that quip, so Astra chuckled politely and then hung up.

She had scratched out a life on this planet, but what good was it if she was alone? What had it all been for, truly? With no Krypton to return to, and not even a prison to call home, what would even be the point of trying to get off this rock? No, this was life, for now. She was just suddenly tired of it being one of isolation and fear.

Fear was sensible. It was rational. She had been subjected to harsh “medical treatments” in prison, and she had been disciplined enough to retreat into her mind while they went on. Who knew whether the humans would do the same if she was found out?

But Alex wouldn’t. She felt sure of that. Alex had no idea what Astra had been through, but had been tuned-in enough to know that she was afraid, and needed to be touched gently and carefully. Alex had made it a point to tell her that she was safe. When was the last time anyone had done that? Astra couldn’t remember.

 

 

********

 

 

Astra had done the math. Assuming no difficulties, she was looking at approximately eighteen hours on the road to Metropolis. She would need to stop to sleep at some point. 

According to the map, the route she was taking would bring her past mountains and lakes. There would be green, and in places, quite a lot of it. She wondered what different flora and fauna she would observe.She could, after all, have taken a bus to Metropolis, but then she wouldn’t have control over what she saw and where she stopped. 

What would Kal-El be like, she wondered. Would he be kind? Welcoming? Suspicious? Did he really know what the symbol on his chest meant? Did he know anything at all about where he was from? Would he understand that she had so much to offer him that way, as someone who had clear, detailed memories of the place he came from?

And what if he didn’t believe her?

 

 

 

******

 

 

In a place called Amarillo, she stopped at something known as the Cadillac Ranch.

She didn’t understand its purpose. It was like Donny’s junkyard, except the broken cars were all lined up in a very neat row, standing up on their noses and looking like people queued up at a grocery store. They were all old, and painted in chaotic, bright colors.She inspected them, only to find many cryptic messages scrawled on them in different colors, by different hands.

She asked a woman lingering nearby, “What does it mean, ‘FRED 2017’?”

The woman shrugged. “I guess Fred was here in 2017?”

“Who is Fred?”

“No idea.”

She looked around.Two other people, a man and a woman, were scrawling something in lurid pink on one of the other cars. She drew closer.“CF + JT,” it read.

“What does that mean?” she asked.

By way of explanation, the young man pressed a button on the can he held.It hissed, and he used it to draw a heart around the letters.“It’s us,” he added. “We’re in love. I’m JT.”

The young woman smiled shyly. “I’m CF, obviously.”

Astra nodded. “May I borrow your paint?”

The young man smiled. “Sure. Just don’t use it all up. And give it back when you’re done.”

She held up the can in a gesture of thanks. “Of course. I’ll only be a moment.”

She chose a car that had “JESUS SAVES” in black on the trunk. She gave the can’s valve a cautious squeeze, the can hissed, and a little bit of pink appeared on the trunk. She had not bothered so very much with the reading and writing system, but she knew enough to scrawl “ALEX” and draw a heart around it.She handed the can back to the couple, thanking them.

“Whoever he is, I hope Alex deserves it,” the young man said.

Astra smiled. “She does.”

 

 

*******

 

 

Astra drove hard after that and spent the night in a cheap trailed park in Kansas City.Music drifted in through the window from a saloon across the street. It was rowdier music than what Alex had played. She wondered whether Alex would enjoy it.

She wondered what Alex’s secrets were. After years of training soldiers, Astra had a good eye for a person with training. She knew Alex had to be more than an enforcer of financial laws.She had seen how strong and fit she was, she had seen those battle wounds on her skin.She had the body of a soldier, not a bookkeeper.

And then there was the matter of her comment on the streak in Astra’s hair.“Mutated KIT gene, my favorite,” she’d said. That sounded like a scientist. Not a bookkeeper.

And what about the sister she had mentioned a few times. “Special needs”, what did that mean?Astra had no idea.

 

 

********

 

 

She arrived in Metropolis early the following evening. It was a shining city, a city of lakes. Not so grand as what she had expected. Its towers were small compared to those of Argo, but they still had a beauty to them. And the water.She could hardly believe that just a day’s drive from where she had been living, that there was so much water.

It teemed, the way Santa Fe had, only more so. She wasn’t used to being around so many people and vehicles. The cacophony was overwhelming at first.

She wandered into a diner on the outskirts of town, sat down, and ordered herself a burger, well done, and a large sweet tea. When the waitress brought her food, Astra asked, “Is it true that Superman lives here?”

She nodded. “Yep.”

“Where would I find him?”

The waitress chuckled. “Couldn’t tell you. He’s a superhero type, so I guess he’s got a lair or something someplace.”

Astra frowned. “But if I wanted to find him, who would know?” She shrugged. “There’s that lady reporter at the Daily Planet who’s supposed to be his girlfriend. She probably knows.”

More words that didn’t make sense. “What’s the Daily Planet?”

The waitress pointed to a metal case with a coin deposit box on it. It was filled with newspapers. “Daily Planet? The newspaper?”

Newspaper. Astra nodded. “Where would I find the people who produce the Daily Planet?”

“Downtown. Not exactly sure the address but you know. Downtown. They’ve got a big statue on the top of the roof. Can’t miss it.”

 

 

*******

 

 

After receiving directions to downtown Metropolis, she found the Daily Planet building, as the waitress in the diner had described it. It loomed over a large, polished stone courtyard with trees in little rows.She found it strangely airless, this open space.She marched in the front doors of the building and went to the guard, who sat behind a tall, forbidding marble desk.

“Can I help you?”

She hadn’t considered until now that her appearance was probably somewhat bedraggled. She had barely slept and had gotten caught in the rain the night before. “I am looking for a woman who works here. The reporter who is Superman’s girlfriend.”

“You got a name?” the guard asked, disinterested. He was playing a game on his phone but she couldn’t see what.

“My name?”

“No, the name of the person you want to see. I can’t let you up there unless you have a name.”

A voice came from behind her. “Oh, god, Frank, she’s looking for me.”

Astra wheeled around. A short blonde woman with sharp eyes and sharp shoes came clacking over to her across the marble floor.

“I keep telling people, I’m not his girlfriend. It’s just professional.”

“Sorry, Miss Cooper,” Frank said, “I just didn’t know if I oughta–”

She waved a hand. “It’s fine.”She drew closer to Astra, sizing her up.“Look, I’m not the lady you want.”After a moment of inspecting her, she asked, “What do you want with her anyway?”

Astra sighed. “I need to get a message to Superman. It’s about his family. I thought that perhaps if I found her, I would find him.”

The woman decided she accepted this story. “Well, her name’s Lois Lane. She owns the Fast Lane on 5th and Chippewa.”

“What’s the Fast Lane?”

“It’s a bar. You can’t miss it.”

Astra inclined her head. “Thank you, Miss Cooper.”

 

 

*******

 

 

The Fast Lane was a loud place with neon in the windows, blaring music, crowds of men, and at the time of Astra’s arrival, a row of shapely women in torn jeans dancing on the bar top and pouring shots into people’s mouths. She watched, bemused, for a long time, wondering whether it was always like this.

She had troubled herself to tidy her hair and, since the weather here was cooler than where she’d come from, she had donned the army jacket again.One of the blonde women on the bar top saw her, crooked a finger to beckon her. Astra glanced around, but looked back. The woman was laughing.

“Me?”

The woman nodded. Astra came up to the bar and the woman commanded her to put her head back and open her mouth. Something poured in from the woman’s bottle. Astra recognized the taste. It was tequila.

She wiped her mouth, and after looking around at the spectacle –this exact moment was being repeated along the entire length of the bar– she determined that she ought to leave a few dollar bills on the bar.

She drew away, making her way through the crowd till she found a male who looked like a staff member.He was hauling a tray full of used glasses back toward the kitchen.

“Sir,” she addressed him. “Where is Lois Lane?”

He pointed to the bar top, where one woman stood, also dancing, but mostly whooping and hollering instructions to the girls and patrons, exhorting them to have a good time and drink and so forth. Astra was tired just looking at her.

“That’s Lois Lane?” She had a hard time imagining a member of the House of El becoming lovers with someone who ran a place like this.

The young man nodded and then scurried off to the kitchen.

After the song ended, Lois climbed down from the bar.She was immediately ringed by two or three of the patrons, while the other women climbed down and began dispensing drinks in the usual way. Astra shouldered through the crowd and lingered behind the three patrons, waiting for them to be done.

Finally, as they concluded their conversation, and Lois was about to walk away, Astra broke in and put a hand on her shoulder. “You’re Lois Lane?”

Lois smiled at her. “Depends who’s asking.”

Astra took a breath. She hated having to shout to be heard over this loud country music.“I’m here with a message for Superman!”

Lois rolled her eyes. “Oh for Christ’s sake, another one? Don’t you idiots ever get tired of coming around here? I’m never going to tell you where he lives!”

Astra shook her head.“You don’t understand! I knew Kal-El when he was a baby!”

Lois froze for a moment, glaring at her. She grabbed Astra by the arm and dragged her back through the kitchen, into a small office. She slammed the door shut and wheeled around on her.Astra heard the bass from the music still thudding through the floor.

“You have ten seconds to tell me how you know his name.” She was small, but she didn’t look afraid of a fight. Astra could easily hurt her, but she’d rather not. It would not be a good way to introduce herself to distant family.

Astra sighed. “I told you. I knew him when he was a baby. I am… a relative of his. My sister married into the house of El.”

Lois shook her head. She reached into a small purse sitting on the desk and whipped out a small pistol, which she now leveled at Astra. “So you’re Kryptonian, then?”

Astra nodded. “Yes. Can you please put the gun down?”

“Why?” Lois challenged her. “You’re Kryptonian. I couldn’t hurt you with this if I wanted to. Unless you’re lying.”

This was going badly. “I promise you, I am not lying. I… I did not receive the same powers that Kal-El did. I don’t know why. Perhaps it’s because he came here when he was small and I only just arrived, but–”

Lois cocked the gun once. “You starfuckers get more and more desperate.”

Astra shook her head. “My name is Astra.My family name is In-Ze. His father was named Jor, and his mother was Lara. If he knows anything at all about his family, he will know my name, if not my face. He is my…nephew… in-law.” That sounded like a thin connection, now that she spoke it. But no matter, she was committed to this course, now. “Perhaps he also knows about his cousin, Kara, and his aunt Alura, who was my sister. We lost many people when Krypton died…”

Lois shook her head. “Look, he’s not here.”She didn’t lower the gun, but she was turning Astra’s story over in her mind. She was intelligent and savvy, that was clear. Astra had not considered that his celebrity would probably attract a number of hangers-on.

“Alright,” Astra said calmly. “I will give you the number sequence to reach me on my cell phone. If you talk to him, you’ll see that I’m telling you the truth. I could not know any of what I know unless I was telling you the truth.”She glanced at the desk, where a pen and paper lay.She nodded toward them, careful to keep her hands still. “May I?”

Lois took a few steps back, and then nodded. “Fine. I don’t know when I’m going to talk to him again, but I’ll tell him you were here. If he’s interested in talking to you, he’ll call.” She stood there, still holding the weapon pointed at Astra while she wrote down her number.

Astra laid the pen down and looked carefully at Lois. “I’m going to walk out that door, now. Will you please be so kind as to not shoot me?”

Lois huffed, released the catch, and put the gun back in her purse. “Fine.”

Astra walked out quickly before the human changed her mind. _Humans and their guns,_ she thought. It would have been an inauspicious end. 

She trudged back to her truck and trailer, which were parked in a large parking garage that charged her far too much money.She paid the attendant, and slid into the cab, her thoughts roiling.She was in a holding pattern. She had no idea whether this excursion was successful or not.

She started her truck, and rolled out of the garage and headed toward the freeway.She needed to find a trailer park for the night. She was so preoccupied with the events of the last few hours, she didn’t notice the figure in the shadows of the parking garage, observing her every movement.


End file.
